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Adding to this thread for future readers who may still have queries regarding this. There are 2 main ways of installing ROS packages: installing through Debian packages or installing through source. For example, if I were to download move_base for ROS kinetic, which is part of the navigation repository, I can do either of the 2 commands below:

Installing through Debian packages:

• sudo apt-get install ros-kinetic-navigation

Installing from source:

• cd ~/catkin_ws/src (or any workspace for that matter)
• git clone https://github.com/ros-planning/navigation.git
• cd .. && catkin_make

Both of these would have installed the move_base package into your system. Debian packages are installed into /opt/ros/kinetic/... while Source packages are installed directly into your workspace which is catkin_ws/src in this case. The benefit of installing from source is that you can edit the source code however you feel like.

Of course if you have installed from Debian prior to this and would now like to install from source, you can simply perform the procedure to install from source and the source package will be overlayed on top of your Debian package which means ROS will look for the source package before looking for a Debian package

Additional source: https://industrial-training-master.readthedocs.io/en/latest/_downloads/ec04d0d00748d96c94a0d3fc3e8c8fff/ROS-I%20Basic%20Developers%20Training%20-%20Session%201.pdf

Adding to this thread for future readers who may still have queries regarding this. There are 2 main ways of installing ROS packages: installing through Debian packages or installing through source. For example, if I were to download move_base for ROS kinetic, which is part of the navigation repository, I can do either of the 2 commands below:

Installing through Debian packages:

• sudo apt-get install ros-kinetic-navigation

Installing from source:

• cd ~/catkin_ws/src (or any workspace for that matter)
• git clone https://github.com/ros-planning/navigation.git
• cd .. && ..
• rosdep update
• rosdep install --from-paths src --ignore-src -r -y (this automatically installs all dependencies for you)
• catkin_make

Both of these would have installed the move_base package into your system. Debian packages are installed into /opt/ros/kinetic/... while Source packages are installed directly into your workspace which is catkin_ws/src in this case. The benefit of installing from source is that you can edit the source code however you feel like.

Of course if you have installed from Debian prior to this and would now like to install from source, you can simply perform the procedure to install from source and the source package will be overlayed on top of your Debian package which means ROS will look for the source package before looking for a Debian package

Additional source: https://industrial-training-master.readthedocs.io/en/latest/_downloads/ec04d0d00748d96c94a0d3fc3e8c8fff/ROS-I%20Basic%20Developers%20Training%20-%20Session%201.pdf